The Lost Souls
by NancyBG-OldMaidWhovian
Summary: Something has crept into the world's electronics to wreak its havoc on all of mankind, and it's up to the Doctor, Amy and Rory to sort things out.


The Lost Souls

PART I

Mandy sat alone in front of her bedroom computer. Outside her window, rain beat its ceaseless patter upon the London pavements, and cars anonymously swished past her flat in the night. None of her three flat mates were home. They'd all been invited to a hen party at the pub down the road, but Mandy wasn't much of a drinker, and had decided to stay in and study.

Her face reflecting the glow of the computer, Mandy scrolled through the posts on her favourite social networking website. Brushing a long strand of dark hair out of her eyes, the young woman glanced down at the book lying on her desk. She really needed to study for her biology exam tomorrow. Her parents had been so excited when she'd been accepted into university, it wouldn't feel right letting them down.

Suddenly realizing that she was famished, Mandy reached for her mobile and rang up a nearby takeaway.

"Hi. I'd like to place an order for delivery." After a minute's pause, she spoke to the other person on the phone. "Yes, I'd like a medium diavola pizza. Oh, and I'd like a diet Coke with that as well please, thanks." Giving the takeaway her address, Mandy rang off and, with a resigned sigh, dutifully picked up her biology text.

About an hour later, she felt if she tried to cram any more obscure details about cells and biomolecules into her head, she'd implode. Deciding to take a break, Mandy once again turned to the computer, and the social networking page.

Scrolling through some posts by people she barely knew-or didn't know at all, Mandy read about this person's drunken pub crawl, that person's latest shag, someone else's colonoscopy.

"Oh, no, let's not go there, thanks." Mandy muttered to herself.

She was about to click away from the social network page, to try finding something to watch on VideoMe, when Mandy noticed that she had a new "devotee" on her page.

The idea was, someone became your "devotee," and received your posts automatically, and then, presumably, if you wanted to follow along with their posts, you clicked on their page and reciprocated. Some people had thousands of "devotees," and Mandy was working at getting at least five hundred by summer. Pleased to have someone to add to her collection, Mandy clicked on the person's home page.

The site directed her to her new devotee's page, which appeared to be someone who went by the user name of "The_Shadow_Maker"

"Hmmmm-OK, mysterious user name. Maybe be it's some kind of geek thing, like the name of a comic book character?" Mandy contemplated, raising an eyebrow. "So, where're you from, then?"

Clicking on The_Shadow_Maker's profile, all this person had listed for a name was "Umbra" and for a geographic location the user had put down, "Quixotic Nebula."

"The Qui-what? What's that supposed to mean?" Mandy shrugged, "Definitely some sort of geek then, I'd say. Oh well, if it brings up my numbers, who cares?" Her hand reached for her mouse, to click on "Become A Devotee of The_Shadow_Maker."

A motor scooter pulled up to the kerb outside the flat. A man in a ball cap and denim jacket got off the scooter, reaching in to a compartment at the back, to retrieve Mandy's pizza.

Upstairs, the windows of Mandy's bedroom were abruptly bathed in bright blue light, like a flash of lightning had struck indoors. Her terrified scream was quickly cut off before it could fully form in her throat.

The pizza delivery man rang bell several times, but no one came to the door. Stepping back, he looked up at the window he'd seen lit by lamp light just a moment before, but now the house seemed dark and deserted.

"Bloody pranksters." The man muttered, as he shoved the pizza back into its compartment and drove away.

Amy and Rory were clasping one another tightly, as the TARDIS rocked and twisted its way through the space-time vortex like a bucking horse. The Doctor never seemed to notice. Wearing his usual tweed suit and a cream and tan colour paisley bow tie, he flitted from one control to the other, with a merry smile upon his face. Amy and her husband-to-be were relieved when the time machine finally came to a juddering halt.

"Right. Earth. London. Twenty-third March, 2011." The Doctor called over to them. "Well, North London, Crouch Hill, to be more exact. That's right where you said you wanted to go. How's that for some excellent navigation?" The Doctor chortled proudly.

Amy rolled her eyes and shrugged. She was taking the Doctor's bragging with a grain of salt. Or rather, a whopping big sack of it. Last time, they were on their way to the beaches of Sardinia, and ended up in the United States, in an industrial wasteland somewhere in Newark, New Jersey, in a raging blizzard...getting chased by a six-legged giant alien slime-spewing cockroach.

"Yeah, so Rory and I will pop out to go visit my cousin Mandy and wish her a happy twenty-first birthday, and not end up being eaten by any dinosaurs or getting zapped by a Dalek, right?" She asked the Doctor hopefully.

"Dinosaurs?" Rory exclaimed. "That'd be a lot more interesting than seeing your cousin." For his pains he got a jab in the ribs from Amy.

"Er—well..." The Doctor pondered.

"Doctor!" Amy admonished him.

"You could always open the door and see for yourself, Amy. Where's that good old Amy Pond sense of adventure, ey?" The Doctor told her, patiently.

"Aren't you coming with us?" Rory asked.

"Erm-." The Doctor said, trying to think of an excuse to keep him away from all that dull human domestic stuff, like visiting someone else's relations. "You see, I've been trying to find the time to recalibrate the helmick regulator, and this would be the perfect day for it..."

Before the Doctor could finish, Amy had grabbed him by the elbow and was dragging him towards the TARDIS doors. Rory, carrying a gift wrapped box, gave the Doctor a cheeky grin, and followed in their wake.

A few minutes later, Amy was ringing the bell at the door of an attached house, part of a row of flats on a side street. The door was answered by a plump young woman in jeans and a purple jumper.

"Yes? She asked, "Can I help you?"

"Is Mandy here? I'm her cousin. We just wanted to pop in and wish her a happy birthday, if it's not too inconvenient." Amy told her.

The Doctor was quick to notice that the woman at the door had suddenly gone quite pale and looked upset. He glanced worriedly at Amy. It seemed she was about to get some bad news.

"You-you mean you don't know?" The young woman stammered. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't know what? Has something happened to Mandy?" Amy asked, suddenly anxious.

Both Rory and the Doctor simultaneously placed reassuring hands on each of Amy's shoulders. Rory glared at the Doctor. Giving him an unhappy look, the Doctor nevertheless tactfully removed his hand.

"You'd better come in." The young woman said soberly.

Introducing herself as Lilly, she opened the door wider and ushered the trio of time travelers inside.

The three of them were sat on the sofa in a small, slightly untidy lounge. Lilly had asked the third flat mate, an Asian girl, to make them all some tea. Then, she seated herself in a nearby armchair.

"I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but Mandy has disappeared. We don't know where she is. The police have been by, but no one seems to know anything."

"When did this happen?" The Doctor asked.

"Two nights ago. We were away at a party, but Mandy decided to stay in and study. The lights were all off when we got home. We'd just bought a card for the electricity from the shop down the road, so we knew it wasn't a power cut. Iksha, my other flat mate, said it looked like Mandy's computer had caused the problem. So, she went down to the basement and checked the fuse box. Apparently it was fine, but still, none of the electrics were working. We called out for Mandy, worried that she might have fallen in the dark, but she never answered." Lilly explained. "By the next afternoon we realized she was really gone, so we telephoned the police."

"How did you know she was missing," Amy asked, "She could've just gone to stay with someone until the power came back on."

"Nothing was missing." Another woman answered. It was Iksha.

The beautiful, slender, elegantly dressed girl came into the room, carrying a tray loaded with tea mugs and chocolate biscuits. As she passed around the refreshment, she explained;

"Her wallet, her clothes, her books...all of it was still in her room. Also, she had to be at university to take an exam the next morning, but her oyster card was still lying on her desk, and when I rang up the university and asked if she'd showed for her exam, the professor told me he'd not seen her."

"Mandy is a good student," Lilly volunteered, "she really wants to make her parents proud, I don't believe she'd ever willingly miss an important exam like she did."

"What about the electricity?" Rory asked, seeing a television set on, with the sound turned down, in a corner of the room. "It seems to be working fine, now."

"The electrician said he couldn't find the problem." Iksha answered him. "The electrics came back on all on their own, sometime during the night. When the man came the next morning, he said it might have been some kind of power surge, but he couldn't tell what where it came from, or why it effected only our flat, and no one else's."

"Where do you think she might have gone? Have the police contacted her friends and family?" Amy asked.

"The police haven't been much help, I'm afraid." Lilly told her. "Mandy's mobile was on the floor of her room, and the police said the last call was to some pizzeria. They contacted the delivery man, and he said no one was home when he came to the door. He thought it was some kind of joke."

Looking up, Amy expected the Doctor to be asking questions, but as they were all talking, the Doctor had somehow quietly slipped out of the room without anyone noticing.

Finding his way to Mandy's cramped bedroom, which held only a bed, a desk and a small Ikea wardrobe, the Doctor set his tea mug on the desk, and sat down in front of the computer. Munching on a biscuit, he turned on the machine.

Nothing happened. Mandy's computer appeared to be completely dead. The Doctor automatically glanced at the wall outlet and power strip. Both were plugged in, and the power strip was working.

Fishing his sonic screwdriver from his pocket, the Doctor took a sip of tea, and played the sonic over the computer. It gave off a low hum, and suddenly the machine sprang to life again.

"Wow, now that's groovy, man!" he said with a satisfied smile, as the machine began its start-up sequence. "OK old son," the Doctor said, setting the mug down and gently patting the computer, "let's get you re-booted and see what's making poor little you feel so out of sorts, ey?"

The Doctor was hard at it, alternating between checking readings on the sonic and rapidly scrolling through Mandy's browser history, when Amy found him. She'd left Rory downstairs to keep the other flat mate's occupied while the Doctor did his thing.

"What is it, Doctor? You think this has something to do with Mandy's computer?" she asked him, sitting down on the bed. "Do you think she's been abducted by some sexual predator she came across on the Internet?"

"I don't know, Amy, but I'd say whomever your cousin came in contact with through this computer, probably wasn't human." He told her.

"What? You mean there's like, some alien inside her computer?" Amy asked incredulously.

"Yes and no. I'm getting readings of some kind of odd residual energy signature. It's definitely not of Earth origins. In fact, it's somehow familiar, but I can't quite put my finger on where I've seen it before. Late middle age doesn't seem to be agreeing with my memory, these days." the Doctor told her, clearly frustrated.

He leaned down and stared at the web pages flying across the screen.

"Maybe I can find something in her browser history, to clue me in on what she was looking at when she disappeared."

The Doctor brought up Mandy's social networking page. Amy heard him give a sudden gasp. She saw him stiffen, and could have sworn for just a moment, a look of fear had passed across his features. He stared at user name on the screen, and shook his head gravely.

"Oh no. Oh no, no, no, no, no." the Doctor muttered, running a hand through his hair. "This is so not good." The Doctor gave a gulp of fear. "He's back."

PART II

Suddenly seeming to remember her presence the Doctor turned to Amy and gave her a jaunty grin.

"Well, I can give you some good news-well, bad news, but bad news that isn't as bad as this sort of bad can really be...which is pretty...erm-bad. What I mean is, that I'm fairly certain that Mandy is still alive, Amy." He reassured her. At least, I know where your cousin is...or rather, isn't."

"I know I should be used to this by now, but you're not making any sense, Doctor." she scolded him.

"I'm sorry, I'm really, really sorry," the Doctor told her, suddenly looking very somber. "She's here...but not here. Your cousin's been essentially reduced to a shadow, a ghost of herself, an echo in an empty room, a lost soul, if you will."

"Doctor, now you're really not making any sense. His friend frowned, clearly getting upset.

Getting up from the chair, the Doctor coaxed Amy into sitting down. Squatting down beside her, he did his best to try to give her a calm, rational explanation , one that hopefully wouldn't upset her to the point of hysterics. He hated it when humans got like that, that's when they stopped thinking altogether. One simply couldn't be rational with a hysterical human.

"Amy, Amy, let me try to explain in a way you'll best understand." The Doctor began gently, taking her hand in his, and gazing into her worried eyes. "Remember the perception filter Prisoner Zero used?"

"Yeah? What about it?" Amy nodded.

"Well, what's happened to Mandy is something like that. She is essentially a ghost. If you see a shadow, a movement out of the corner of your eye, that's her. She still exists. Wherever Mandy is, she can still think and feel as she always had, her memories and knowledge are all still intact. However, her body no longer has any substance. She's a thought, really. Her body is gone. If seen at all, she is merely a flicker of movement out of the corner of your eye, a wisp of white going around the corner, a shadow on the wall where there shouldn't be one... is just the echo of her mind projecting into our own time and space."

"Is she dead then?" Amy asked, swallowing down her sudden sorrow, "I mean, she can't come back, because, Doctor, without a body, how can Mandy still be alive?"

The Doctor straightened up and sat on the bed beside Amy. He sighed. This was really difficult to explain to a non-Time Lord. His people had dealt with this sort of thing, eons ago. But, Amy was clever, he just needed to figure out how to make her understand him better. Heaving a sigh, the Doctor gave it another go.

"There's this being from the dawn of time, Amy. He's called Umbra in the legends from the Dark Times, but he tends to prefer to call himself, "The Shadow Maker."

"He sounds a wee pompous, if you ask me." Amy told him.

The Doctor smiled, and patted his friend on the arm.

"Yes, he was always an arrogant sort. He's almost impossible to see, he's like a wraith, flitting in and out between dimensions."

"Like one of those shadows on the wall, you mean?" Amy asked.

"Yes," the Doctor nodded. "because Umbra was so difficult to observe, he believed himself to be immune to censure, thought that no one could stop him. When he first encountered my home planet of Galifrey, Umbra thought of the Time Lords, as mere children. But when he decided to launch an attack on some students of the Prydonian Academy, he found out that we weren't exactly the naïve, benign beings he'd assumed we'd be."

"What happened to him?" Amy asked, always interested in finding out more about her mysterious raggedy Doctor.

"The Time Lords defeated him," The Doctor related, folding has arms and thinking back on that place in the universe he could never see again. "They put him on trial, and found him guilty of course. They placed him in a time lock chamber with a failsafe device. That's a prison no one could ever escape from. No one. Not even a Time Lord. You were frozen in time forever. And even if you somehow defeated the time lock and attempted escape, the failsafe device would kick in, and you would have your very existence splintered into a hundred pieces and then sent into a thousand different times and dimensions. Which," the Doctor said, biting his lip and looking up at the ceiling, "makes me wonder how Umbra could possibly be here, apparently whole and unharmed, in this particular time and place. It should be categorically impossible."

Lilly came into the room just then. She saw the Doctor and Amy sitting on Mandy's bed, and gave them a sad smile.

"I'm sorry if I'm disturbing you. You can stay here as long as you like, I know how upsetting this must be for you. Were you and Mandy close, then?"

"Sort of." Amy said. "She used to come and visit my aunt and me during the summer hols, sometimes."

"Well, you both can stay here for as long as you need. I just wanted to know if you'd like more tea?" Lilly asked them.

Just then, Mandy's mobile rang. It was was sitting on the desk, and started playing "Rain" by Mika. Lilly picked it up.

"There's a text message." she told them hopefully "maybe it's Mandy, calling to tell us she's alright." Then her face fell. "No, it's from someone calling himself "The Shadow Maker. I wonder who that could be?"

As Lilly stared at the screen, the Doctor saw a tiny blue flicker of light coming from the screen.

"No, wait! Don't!" He shouted, leaping up off the bed, reaching to knock Lilly's hand away, but he was too late.

Amy and the Doctor could only stare at the young woman's horrified face, her mouth open in a silent scream, as she was sucked out of existence in a blaze of blue light. Amy and the Doctor both had to cover their eyes, but even so, they both knew that Lilly had been attacked in the same manner as Mandy. They heard the mobile fall to the floor with a thud. There was a faint tang in the air, like turps.

Rory came rushing into the room. Seeing Amy and the Doctor, he gave a sigh of relief. Rory sniffed, wrinkling his nose.

"Smells like a pub in here. Have you two been drinking , Amy?" He asked her.

"That's two down." The Doctor said suddenly.

Then, his eyes widened. He tore out of the room and back to the lounge. Rory looked at Amy, she gave him a shrug, and they both ran after the Doctor.

The Doctor had just reached the lounge, when he saw Iksha reaching for her laptop, which was sitting on the coffee table in front of the sofa. Before the Doctor could utter a word of warning, another flare of intense blue-white light reached out from the machine, and the Asian woman also vanished.

"No, no, no, no, no!" The Doctor yelled, tearing at his hair as he stood helplessly beside the place where Mandy and Lilly's flat mate, Iksha, had been only moments before. "Why are you here, why now...and why them?" He shouted to himself.

Amy came up and touched the Doctor on the arm.

"Do you think this Shadow wots-it is targeting the people in this flat on purpose, Doctor? Why would he want to do that? She asked him.

Pacing the room, the Doctor merely shook his head.

"I don't know. It might have something to do with some spatial-time anomaly...or, it might be because of that crack in the lounge wall..."

As one, Amy and Rory turned to look at the wall behind the television set. It had abruptly opened up into the shape of a crooked smile, with a bright white light pouring out of it.

"It's here, as well?" Amy gasped.

"Yes. And, I think it's getting a little wider." The Doctor agreed.

PART III

Amy and Rory were sat on the sofa, watching the Doctor. He had his sonic out, and was fiddling with Iksha's laptop computer.

"Can't you just, I dunno', use your sonic thingy to coax this Shadow Maker thing out of there?" Rory asked.

"Thingy? It's a screwdriver, Rory," the Doctor muttered crossly, "not a 'thingy.' And no, it won't work that way, if it did, we'd all be back in the TARDIS having our teatime, on our way to see yet another wonder of time and space. So, a little bit of hush, if you don't mind. Einstein never would've gotten past basic algebra, if you'd been around nagging him with all sorts of useless questions all the time."

"You are getting tetchy in your old age." Amy told the Doctor. "Rory and I were only curious , Doctor. Besides, I thought you told me once, that the only stupid questions were the one's that no one ever asks."

"Sorry." The Doctor said, looking at them apologetically. He'd ceased working on the laptop, and casually tossed it over his shoulder.

"You see, Amy, Rory," the Doctor began with a sigh, as he sat down on the coffee table, putting his feet up on the sofa between his two friends, "Umbra isn't an actual creature of flesh and blood. He's not made of gas or anything else."

"Well, what is he then? A Ghost?" Rory asked, skeptically.

"He's a creature of the Dark Times, an abstract being, much like the Weeping Angels. Look," the Doctor leaned forward and explained, "when you were children, you believed in Father Christmas, you thought he was real, could fly around the world with his reindeer, leave presents at two billion or so homes in one night, right?"

"Yeah." Amy answered, "and, I thought that Brum the car was real, as well. What's that prove?"

"Awww-, I loved Brum!" The Doctor grinned. Rory nodded his head, and smiled, as well. Then, the Doctor's face grew more serious.

"Suppose, Amy, just suppose," he explained, gesturing with his hands unconsciously in his eagerness to get his point across, "that, by thinking Father Christmas was real, he 'became' real?"

"But, Doctor, I don't know about Amy's cousin," Rory said, "but Lilly and Iksha never even mentioned anything about this Umbra or Shadow Maker, or whatever. I don't think they'd ever heard of him."

"Yeah, but wait a minute Rory. "Amy said, looking holding up her hand for him to stop talking. "I think I understand." Amy said, "Er—Maybe, anyway." She looked at the Doctor. "When Lilly was holding the mobile, she said it was a call from the Shadow Maker. So, maybe if she thought the call was from a real person, that automatically made him real to her? Is that what you mean, Doctor?"

"Yes!" Oh, you are good, Amy Pond, you were so very worth coming back for!" The Doctor exclaimed, jumping up excitedly.

In doing so, he knocked his sonic screwdriver, which had been put down on the coffee table beside him, on to the floor. Bending down to retrieve the sonic, the Doctor caught the barest flicker of blue light coming from the back of the television set.

"Amy, Rory, I need you to listen to me, like you've never listened before. I want you both to get out of this house, right now. Whatever happens in the next few seconds, don't look back and absolutely, positively, do NOT listen. Put your fingers in your ears, stand next to a foghorn, pretend you're being forced to listen to a speech by Alistair Darling, or a Justin Beiber song, it doesn't matter. You do whatever it takes, but do not listen to anything but your own thoughts. I mean it!" The Doctor flung at them, kneeling on the floor, quickly adjusting settings on his sonic. "And once you get outside, don't look back. Turn your backs, walk away. I'll catch you up. Now both of you...run!" He demanded.

"Doctor, what the..." Rory started to ask.

Rory didn't get the chance. Amy grabbed him by the hand, and made for the front door of the flat.

"Will you be OK, Doctor?" she shouted.

"I'll be fine, Amy, I promise."he called to her, not looking up, concentrating on the task he had at hand. "Now, both of you, move! Run! Don't worry about me, I'll join you as soon as I can."

Amy and Rory bolted out of the house, and were stood on the pavement outside, holding hands. Rory started to turn to look, but Amy stopped him.

"We can't just leave him there, Amy!" Rory protested. "We should go back."

"No, I trust the Doctor, if he says not to look or listen, we'd better do what he says. "Come on, Rory," Amy said softly, trying to hide the fear she felt for her alien best mate, "I'm sure he'll be alright. The Doctor knows what he's doing. Hey, look," she gestured, pointing down the street. "There's a pub down on the corner, we can wait for the Doctor there."

Inside the lounge of the flat, the Doctor was sat on the sofa, waiting. The light from the crack in the wall cast shadows in the room, but the Doctor didn't seem to notice. Just then, a tingle of electricity seemed to creep up his spine, as the television in the corner suddenly sprang into life. A tall, spindly, black robed figure came into view. The figure's face was hidden deep in the recesses of the cowled hood he wore.

"And a good afternoon to you, everyone. I'm your host, The Shadow Maker, and you're watching The End of the World As You Know It." The figure on the screen intoned, in his inflection much like any ordinary human male talk show presenter's, only, with a voice that was, perhaps, a bit deeper and more grating. Like the voice of an ancient, otherworldly being.

The Shadow Maker seated himself on a stool on what appeared to be a black-painted set, with the words 'The End of the World As You Know It' emblazoned in red on a floor to ceiling screen behind him.

"For our first guest today we have a real treat in store for you. He's a man from a race nearly as old as I am, the last of an extinct species, a race known as the Time Lords. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you, The Doctor!"

In the background, fake applause sounded. In all this time, the Doctor seemingly completely ignored the television, never once looking up at the screen. Instead, he was sitting with his arms folded, chin resting on his chest, apparently napping.

"Oh dear. It appears that our guest is feeling a little camera shy, today. Let's see if I can encourage him to join me here on stage, shall I?" The Shadow Maker said, almost genially.

Suddenly, on the black-painted stage, Mandy appeared next to The Shadow Maker. The young woman was wearing the same lavender and lace tunic top and faded designer jeans that she'd had on when she'd disappeared. She looked terrified, her head constantly swiveling around, her legs quaking, completely immobilized with fear.

"Where am I?" Mandy asked in a quavering voice, "Oh my God, what am I doing here, where is this place?"

Other than a very slight clenching of his jaw, the Doctor remained immobile, apparently ignoring Mandy's sudden appearance.

"Shall I tell her, Doctor? Shall I tell this poor, innocent young human girl, what's truly become of her? I will, if you won't come to me. I will tell them all, if you insist on-."

Without warning, the Doctor's hand shot out, holding the sonic as if it were a weapon, pointing straight at the television. The sonic gave a piercing shriek, as the screen went dark.

Amy and Rory were sitting at the bar of the pub with two drinks in front of them, but neither was drinking anything. They both were looking off into space, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Doctor. A burly bald man wearing an American football jersey, came running into the pub. He ran up to the bartender.

"You're not going to believe this mate, but a whole building up the road suddenly disappeared in a bolt of lightning. And it's not even raining out!"

The bartender stopped wiping down the bar long enough to laugh at this.

"What you been drinkin' then, Carl? Floor cleaner? Bit early for you, isn't?" he snorted. "Did ya' hear that, you two?" he said, turning to where Rory and Amy were sitting. Only to find they'd gone.

"Go sober up, you idiot," he scolded Carl, " you're driving away the customers!"

Amy and Rory pounded up to the house where Mandy and her flat mates lived...only to find that it had completely disappeared. In it's place was dirt and pipes gushing water and gas. In the distance, sirens could be heard, and a police constable was running towards them, speaking into his radio as he ran. The Doctor was nowhere in sight.

The Doctor placed a hand on Amy's shoulder, and spoke softly in her ear.

"Amy, I'm right here."

She kept on talking to Rory, as if the Doctor wasn't there. He could see and hear Amy and Rory, but he couldn't touch them, or speak to them. The Doctor held up his hand. It appeared real to him, but he knew it was only an illusion. Taking away his hand, he stepped back and looked sad.

Staring helplessly at his two friends, he knew that he couldn't communicate with them, perhaps not to any living being, ever again. The Doctor was a ghost of himself...literally.

"What are we going to do?" A panicked Amy said, still boggled by the sight of the missing house. "I can't believe he's gone. There must be something we can do, we can't just stand here, looking at an empty lot, Rory."

"I don't know what we can do, Amy." he answered, simply shrugging. "I'm sorry."

A policeman came up to them, waving them away back from the empty lot. The smell of escaping gas was getting much stronger. Water continued to gush like a geyser from a pipe projecting from the dirt where the building had been. More sirens were heard, coming closer. An ambulance and several fire apparatus were tearing around the corner by the pub, charging their way towards a scene of growing chaos.

One of the policeman's waving arms came within inches of the Doctor's nose. He involuntarily stepped back.

"How very rude! I should report you for that. Bad manners are criminal." The Doctor sniffed.

Of course, the policeman showed no reaction. Two of his fellows were already unwinding yellow caution tape across the pavement in front of the empty lot, and a policewoman was supervising the placement of a barrier to block off traffic. The policeman who had offended the Doctor, after conferring with one of the men with the caution tape, headed across the street to keep an eye on the crowd. The Doctor followed him.

Amy and Rory hadn't left, only moved away, to across the street. A growing crowd was forming there of curious neighbours and passers-by. Rory held Amy's hand. They stood a ways apart from the crowd, still watching the empty lot, hoping that the Doctor would magically reappear. But, there was no sign of him.

"Wherever he is, I'm sure he's trying to do something. He wouldn't just give up." Amy said, determined not to shed the tears she felt welling up inside her.

"I believe you." Rory said softly, giving Amy's hand a gentle squeeze and kissing her tenderly on the cheek. "But, do you really think it's safe to stay here?"

"Is anywhere safe, Rory?" She retorted, "You saw what that Shadow Maker thing can do."

"I was thinking about that escaping gas, Amy." Rory sighed, understanding why his fiancée had snapped at him. "But now that you mention it, I suppose you're right."

"Sorry, Rory." Amy apologized, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"This is hardly the place for that sort of thing, you know." A stern voice said. It was the middle aged policeman who had shooed them away from the front of the empty lot. "You'll both have to leave, now. We're evacuating this entire area."

The Doctor, unbeknown to his friends, was hovering just behind them. Amy had been right. He was furiously trying to think of a way to get back, or at least a way to communicate with them. Sighing, he jammed his hands into the pocket of his tweed suit...and they closed upon his sonic screwdriver. The Doctor's eyes lit up with joy. He pulled out the sonic, held it up before his eyes, clutched in his fist, a broad smile forming on his lips.

"Oh don't I love you, my old friend!" He shouted with glee, giving the sonic a big loud kiss.

The policeman had turned away from Amy and Rory, when his radio squawked. Amy suggested heading off towards where the Doctor had parked his TARDIS. The Doctor watched them walk away, but was distracted by a sudden flare of light. The radio mic the policeman held in his hand suddenly seem to have a faint blue glow. Amy and Rory had their backs turned, and didn't notice it.

Giving the sonic screwdriver a quick adjustment, the Doctor held it aloft, as it gave off a warbling, high-pitched squeal. Amy and Rory both stopped dead and gasped, as they heard the Doctor's seemingly disembodied voice ringing out from just behind them.

"No, don't stop. Run! Run like you've never run before! Get to the TARDIS, wait for me there." This last command slowly faded, so that they could barely hear it, but it didn't matter, as Rory and Amy heeded the Doctor's advice and ran as fast as they could, away from the crowd.

Some people in the crowd may have heard the Doctor, but most heard the voice on the policeman's radio.

"This is an all-points alert from the Shadow Maker, I am coming for you all." The voice said. And, then there was a bright blue flash, as everyone who heard the voice, vanished into thin air.

PART IV

A breathless Amy and Rory crashed to a halt in front of the doors of TARDIS. Though he Doctor had said they'd landed in Crouch Hill, in reality, he'd not been quite that precise. He'd actually parked his ship beside the busy Apex Corner roundabout. In their headlong flight, hampered by police barricades, somehow the pair of them had got turned around.

Coming from a totally different direction from that which they'd taken earlier in the day, the couple had found that they could only access the Doctor's ship by dodging motorbikes, white vans and assorted cars, and vaulting a fence, to get to it. It had been almost as hazardous as trying to escape The Shadow Maker.

A white van was passing by. Amy watched it as it seemed to be slowing down. The driver, a young man in a leather jacket, was staring intently ahead. Slowly the van rolled to a stop and almost casually drifted up onto the kerb, until it came to rest against a fence. Amy and Rory both stared at the now-empty van. The driver had vanished.

"The driver must have been listening to the radio." Amy said softly. "The poor man."

Amy tried opening the TARDIS doors, but they wouldn't budge. They both looked around, but there was no sign of the Doctor.

"Now what?" Rory panted, throwing up his hands, as the two of them stood staring helplessly at the locked TARDIS.

"I dunno." Amy shrugged.

"Oh, good. Well, at least you're honest about it." Rory said, slightly sarcastically. He tried tugging away at the doors, on the hope they'd somehow magically open. They didn't.

"I could lie, like the Doctor, and say that I'm coming up with a brilliant plan." Amy suggested helpfully.

"Actually, I think that's my line, Amy." Came an almost distant echo of a familiar voice in Amy's ear. She jumped.

"Doctor?" Amy cried out. "Is that you? Where are you?"

"I'm right here, in front of the TARDIS, but you won't be able to see me. I'm using the sonic screwdriver to boost my voice's natural biological magnetic resonance to a frequency the human ear can register, if only very faintly."

Suddenly, from all over the neighbourhood, dozens of cats started yowling, causing Rory to jump this time.

"What the hell?" He cried out.

"Oh. And the sonic's frequency modulator also sometimes scares the hell out of cats. Sorry. Let me make a quick adjustment here..." The Doctor answered, his voice trailing off as he concentrated on his task.

Amy heard a slight buzzing noise, and the cat's caterwauling suddenly ceased. She wasn't sure if the Doctor had been apologizing to Rory or the cats. She suspected the latter rather than the former.

"But, if you're invisible Doctor, how are we supposed to get into the TARDIS. You have the key."

"Oh right. An oversight on my part. I really should give you a key, shouldn't I? Remind me later to make one for you." The Doctor told her.

"That's assuming there actually is a later." Rory muttered, shifting his feet, anxiously eying the abandoned van.

"But...we don't have a key," Amy reasoned, "At least, I assume if you're invisible, so's the key, right? So...what do we do?"

"Now, erm-that's the tricky bit you see." The Doctor answered cryptically.

"Somehow I knew you'd say that, Doctor." Rory said, wagging a finger at him.

"Right. You got me Rory, spot on. Good for you." The Doctor said impatiently. "You see, Amy, Rory, in order to use the sonic to open the TARDIS doors, I'll need to recalibrate the amplitude frequency. Unfortunately, if I don't get it precisely exact, it will make me disappear completely. As in forever." With only the briefest of pauses, the Doctor carried on cheerfully, "But, the chances of that happening are, oh, I'd say, roughly three-hundred and seventy-eight to one, so I've got that going for me." He added cheerfully.

"Oh yeah, of course, Doctor." Amy nodded, with a voice that sounded less than sure of his success. "I suppose I don't need to tell you to be careful, then."

"I'm always careful." The Doctor said with more confidence than he felt.

"Noooo—you're not, but it was nice of you to say it, anyway. You know, trying to reassure us and all that." Amy replied patiently, giving an encouraging smile in what she hoped was the Doctor's general direction.

Faintly, she and Rory could both hear soft warbling noises coming from in front of the TARDIS doors. They both guessed that the Doctor was making some adjustments to the sonic, in preparation to opening them.

"Doctor?" Amy asked quietly, "What's it like? I mean, where Mandy's gone? Is it really awful for them?" She felt Rory put a reassuring hand upon her shoulder. There was a long silence from the Doctor.

"I think you should tell her, Doctor." Rory told him. "It is her cousin, after all. She has a right to know."

"I suppose," the Doctor said somberly, "that it's a bit like being locked away in solitary confinement, but inside a glass cage. You can see everything going on around you, but you can't touch the outside world." Unseen by his two friends, the Doctor gave an involuntary shudder. It was in fact, one of his own worst nightmares.

"OK, well, here goes then, wish me luck." The Doctor's barely discernible disembodied voice told them, abruptly.

Rory put his arms around Amy, as they waited for the TARDIS doors to open. And waited. And waited. Nothing was happening.

"Doctor?" Amy asked, her voice filled with trepidation. "Are you still there?

They could hear nothing in response. Not even a sound of the sonic screwdriver. Then, Amy realized, there wasn't hardly any noise at all. Just a few cooing pigeons and the wind. Whirling around, she stared open-mouthed, at the sight before her.

Cars and other vehicles were abandoned on and along the roadways. A bicycle lay on its side in the middle of a zebra crossing, an i-pod dangling from the handlebars. A dog stood forlorn on the pavement across the road, it's leash trailing, a dropped mobile phone by it's feet.

"How could we not notice this, Amy?" Rory wondered aloud, as he also caught sight of the empty streets. "This Shadow Maker is everywhere, now. He's going to make the whole planet disappear, isn't he?"

"Shut up, Rory!" Amy said. "The Doctor will sort it."

"I think the Doctor's gone, Amy." He said gently. And indeed, there was no indication that the Doctor was still with them.

"No! He can't be! Doctor? Where are you?" Amy called out. But, no one answered.

Rory was leaning a shoulder against the TARDIS door, when it suddenly swung inward. He stumbled back onto Amy, nearly knocking her down. To avoid that, Rory's quick thinking caused him to grab her. Unfortunately, since he was also stumbling on the pavement, one hand caught Amy on the shoulder, while the other one accidentally grabbed onto a certain prominent part of her chest.

"Rory! This is hardly the time or the place!" Amy shouted at him. Then, as they both righted themselves, she whispered in his ear, "Maybe later, if we're still here, yeah?"

"Er—Amy, I didn't..." Suddenly realizing what Amy just inferred, Rory quickly nodded his head. "OK, sure, whatever you say."

"Oh, that's brilliant. Here I am, trying to save the world, and you two are busy getting all...amorous." Came the Doctor's voice from inside the TARDIS, sounding slightly perturbed.

"Doctor!" Amy yelled joyously, running into the time machine's console room, "You're alright, you're here!"

Rory followed Amy inside, and they both gazed around them, seeing a seemingly empty control room, the TARDIS console lit up with blue florescent type lighting, the red and coppery interior illuminated by the roundel lights embedded in the walls.

"You're still invisible, then?" Amy asked, sadly. For a moment she had hoped the Doctor had found a way to come back.

"Well, yes. But, not for long, hopefully." said the Doctor's bodiless voice.

"Where are you?" She questioned him, looking around for a clue to the Doctor's whereabouts.

"Yeah, I was wondering about that. I mean, if we walk around in here, would we bump into you, or can we walk right through you?" Rory asked curiously, standing beside Amy.

"Uh, I'd really rather you didn't walk right through me, if you don't mind, Rory. I'd feel so...violated." The Doctor said, indignantly. "And, I'm standing in front of the console monitor, so as long as you don't hover over around the machinery, everything will be hunky dory...or is that dory hunky? I sometimes get these quaint human expressions mixed up."

"So, Doctor, what happens now?" Amy asked.

"Depends on which it is, Amy." The Doctor's voice answered.

As she walked closer to the console, Amy could hear a slight noise in the background, the soft hum of the sonic screwdriver. She guessed the Doctor was still using it to amplify his voice so they could hear him.

"Which what is, Doctor?" She had no idea what he was on about, now.

"Hunky-dory, or dory hunky." The Doctor's voice said.

"The first one." Rory replied, helpfully.

"Right, then everything is going to be hunky-dory, and shipshape in Bristol fashion...unless..." The Doctor told them.

"Unless what?" Rory questioned him, his brows knotting with worry, as he leaned against the safety rail. He didn't like the sudden change of tone in the Doctor's voice.

"Oh, nothing to worry about. It'll be fine." The Doctor replied, a little too light-heartedly.

"What shouldn't we be worried about, Doctor?" Amy asked, as she came to stand well back from the console monitor, where she assumed the Doctor was stationed.

"Really, it'll be fine." The Doctor said dismissively. "Now, hush. I'm trying to work here. Silence good. Distractions bad. Rory."

"What? I didn't say anything!" Rory objected.

"Yes you did, just now. You said, em'What? I didn't say anything/em.'" The Doctor told him.

"Quit changing the subject, Doctor. I know you're nine-hundred and whatever years old, and our age in your years probably makes us toddlers or something...but we're human, and we're not children. So, just tell us what is the matter, already." Amy scolded him.

"Yeah, sorry Amy. You too, Rory." The Doctor said contritely.

Judging by the direction of his voice, Amy guessed he'd changed places to somewhere over to her left. Unconsciously she shifted slightly, to be nearer to him.

"OK, I think I might be able to bring back myself, Mandy and everyone else." The Doctor told them.

"But that's great news!" Rory said, getting up and going over to stand beside Amy. He put his arm around her reassuringly.

"There's a catch though." The Doctor conceded.

"Oh." Amy said, disappointed. "There's always a catch, it seems, with you, Doctor." She muttered.

"Not always!" the Doctor argued, his voice now coming from the opposite side of the console. "Only sometimes. Well, I say sometimes, but I suppose quite a lot, really. But, if life were easy, think how dreadfully dull it would be. You're born, live an easy life full of...really dull stuff, then you die. Pffft-! What would be the point of it all, without a few challenges and hardship to keep things really interesting?" They heard him give a big sigh. "Thing is, what I need to do, to counteract The Shadow Maker's version of reality, is to re-create his victim's own version of reality. And to do that, I am going to have to get underneath the console, and do something I've never done before. I'll have to directly manipulate the space-time vortex."

"And, let me guess;" Amy said, "doing that is just a wee dangerous?"

"Very." The Doctor agreed. "If I make even the smallest mistake, it'll throw the whole of the space time continuum out of whack, and the universe will abruptly collapse in on itself. It'll make the Big Bang seem like a firecracker. And trust me, you don't want to light the blue touch paper on this baby. That would be so un-cool."

"Oh well, that doesn't sound so bad." Rory said sarcastically.

"Risking killing everyone and everything in the entire universe isn't something I do lightly, Rory." The Doctor said quietly.

"Sorry, Doctor. That was stupid of me." Rory said, chastised.

"You're not stupid Rory, you just didn't have your thinking cap on. Shame on you." The Doctor told him. "I expect better from Amy's significant other." There was a pause, then his voice said, "I'm going to go underneath now. I'll need to do some ionic soundings of the vortex, before I commit to manipulating the TARDIS's atmospheric crystal power defractor."

A couple of minutes later, Amy and Rory heard the Doctor's voice coming faintly from beneath them.

"Amy, Rory," the Doctor told them, his voice suddenly sad and somber, "I'll need the sonic to do all this, so I won't be able to use it to amplify my voice any longer. If this doesn't work, I can't promise that the two of you will be safe. If you want me to stop what I'm doing, now would be the time to tell me. You'll both be safe from The Shadow Maker, as long as the pair of you stay inside the TARDIS."

Rory and Amy looked at each other searchingly. The idea of living the rest of their lives inside the TARDIS wasn't so bad. But then, they each thought of the billions of people on earth, forced to live out the rest of their lives virtually as ghosts. Almost as if they were both connected mentally, Amy and Rory nodded to each other.

"No, Doctor." Amy called down to him, "Rory and I wouldn't want to live at the expense of everyone else on earth. It wouldn't be worth it, our lives are nothing compared to six billion others...but," she said sympathetically, "what about the decision you have to make?"

"You're lives aren't nothing, Amy." The Doctor told her firmly. "Not to me. And, neither are the lives of the people on this planet. I don't want to do this. But, I have no choice. If I don't try this, The Shadow Maker won't stop with the earth. He'll move on to other planets, other times. Nowhere in the universe will be safe. I absolutely cannot let that happen."

Rory and Amy waited tense moments, while the invisible Doctor fiddled with the time rotor beneath the console. They both became alarmed, when a nasty chemical smell filled the air, and blue smoke began to rise up from below. They both made faces and Amy instantly put her hand over her nose.

"Ew! Smells like some...giant alien, farted!" Amy complained, trying to find an apt description for the stench. Rory simply shrugged.

"No worse than some of the smells I've encountered as a hospital nurse." He said, pulling up his shirt over his nose. "Though if I'd known the TARDIS could smell like this, I might've stayed home! You could have at least warned me, Amy"

"That's because it never did this before, Rory. I'm hardly an expert on alien machinery, am I?" She retorted.

All of the sudden, the TARDIS began to vibrate violently. With a startled yell, Amy was thrown against Rory, as they both grabbed onto the safety rail for dear life.

Abruptly, the shaking stopped. Looking down through the glass floor, they could see nothing through the smoke. Taking Rory by the hand, Amy lead the way down the steps to the area beneath the console. Being careful not to step in any of the holes in the floor, Amy desperately looked for any sign of the Doctor. But the blue tinted smoke was too thick to see beyond her arm's length.

Then, like a magician appearing out of a conjuring trick, there he was. The Doctor walked through the seemingly impenetrable haze, coughing and waving away the smoke. His face and clothing were tinged with blue soot, but Amy didn't care. She ran up to the Doctor and gave him a big hug. Which he wholeheartedly returned, with a dazzling smile and a twinkle in his eyes.

Amy and Rory followed the Doctor, as he bounded up the stairs to the TARDIS console. Flipping on the monitor screen, he stared at it, reading rapidly scrolling data, as the geometric Gallifreyan language told him what he wanted to know.

Amy peered over the Doctor's shoulder, as images began to appear on screen. It was people, standing in the middle of streets and pavements, looking bewildered. Amy gave a triumphant yell of joy, when she spotted her cousin Mandy, among them.

"It's her! It's Mandy! Doctor you saved them!" Rory said, turning to slap the grinning Amy a high five. He gave the Doctor a friendly, if awkward, pat on the back.

"That was...amazing. Thank you Doctor, for Amy, and for all of us. If there's ever anything I can do for you, just name it." Rory told him.

"Yes, yes it was really amazing, Rory." The Doctor said, with a smug expression. "And you know, there is something very important you can do for me."

"Just name it, Doctor!" Rory said, looking like he expected that he was about to be sent on some noteworthy mission.

"I could really do with a nice cup of coffee. Extra strong, cream, no sugar, please." The Doctor told him.

Rory's face fell, his ego deflated, but a promise was a promise.

"Oh. Right. Of course, Doctor, I'll get right on it." As he left, Amy did her best to hide her amusement, as she gave him a sympathetic peck on the cheek.

"Off you go, coffee man." She told him, smiling. "Tell you what, I'll give you a hand."

"Thanks, Amy." Rory replied, as they walked up the stairs to the corridor leading to the TARDIS kitchens.

"No worries. I've had your coffee, Rory, and I like the Doctor too much to subject him to it." She said with a smirk.

Meanwhile, the Doctor disappeared into the TARDIS interior, to clean himself up.

A short time later, Amy and Rory came back into the console room. They found the Doctor, soot-less and in clean clothes, including a new bow tie, roaming around the console, flicking switches and checking readings.

Rory held a shiny antique Georgian-era copper coffee pot, with a trickle of white steam coming out of the spout. Amy's right hand gripped a modern white coffee mug with an image of a red WWII poster imprinted on it, that read, em'Keep Calm and Carry On/em.'

Suddenly, Amy saw the console monitor begin to flicker with blue static electricity.

"Oh no, no way, that's just not possible! How could he get inside the TARDIS?" The Doctor said, in a panicky voice, backing away from the screen.

Before the Doctor could say anything more, a dark figure appeared on screen. This time, he was dressed identically to the Doctor, only all in black, except for red suspenders and a red bow tie. The Shadow Maker's grim, cadaverous face glowered evilly from the screen. His body was framed by a blue aura.

"You have only temporarily won the game for the people of earth, Doctor. But, beware. This game isn't over yet." The Shadow Maker spoke, in a deep, smooth, oily voice.

"How did you escape your prison on Galifrey? It should have been impossible." The Doctor asked. As he did so, he backed protectively towards Amy and Rory.

"Towards the end of the Time War, Rassilon and the Council of Twelve secretly promised me my freedom, in exchange for my help in defeating the Daleks. The Daleks captured me, soon after my release, but before the emperor of the Daleks could have me imprisoned on his ship, and just before the destruction you wrought, I stole a vortex manipulator, and escaped from you all. Now, no one shall ever imprison me again."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, spoken like a true megalomaniac. Man, I cannot tell you how so unimpressed I am. If you were captured twice, you can be captured again." The Doctor warned the figure on the monitor screen.

"Not so, Doctor." The Shadow Maker said, "With the unlimited power of your TARDIS, I can never be stopped. Not by the last of the Time Lords, or the Daleks or any other creature or being in all of time and space. The universe will become my plaything." You are powerless to stop me."

"Oh give me a break." The Doctor scoffed. "And I mean by that, a coffee break. Look, Shadow Maker, it's been a long day, I'm tired, and if I have to stand here and listen to you blather on, I could seriously use a good stiff cup of coffee."

With lightning speed, the Doctor suddenly grabbed the coffee pot out of Rory's hands, threw the lid down on the glass floor, and flung the hot coffee all over the console monitor. The blue static electricity surrounding the monitor suddenly turned red, as The Shadow Maker abruptly cried out in pain, and began writhing about.

"Nooooooo! This can't be happening!" he screamed.

Dropping the coffee pot on the glass floor, the Doctor stood back and folded his arms. He watched apathetically, as The Shadow Maker's image slowly shrank down, blurred, turned into smoke, and then disappeared completely. Amy and Rory both jumped, when the console monitor blew up in a shower of sparks.

"Wha—what'd you do?" a bewildered Rory asked.

"That was a perfectly good pot of coffee, I'll have you know!" Amy protested. "But at least you've put it to good use, it seems. Wow, talk about caffeine overload!"

"The Shadow Maker was a being of the Dark Times. Almost nothing could destroy him completely. That's why my people imprisoned him in the first place." The Doctor explained, reaching for a switch on the console.

Instantly, a blower came on somewhere, slowly removing the blue smoke from the bottom of the time rotor, and the white smoke from the exploding monitor, out of the console room.

"There, that's better!" The Doctor beamed. "Well, I said almost nothing cold harm him. There was one single chemical element, in all the universe, which when combined with certain other chemicals, is poisonous to the Umbra creatures. And of course, The Shadow Maker being one of the Umbra, it's guaranteed to make him kick off. That one chemical is so rare, that it can only be found in one place."

"Let me guess," Amy said, glancing down at the now-empty coffee pot, "somewhere right here on earth?"

"Correctamun—darn, I said I'd never say that again." The Doctor said to himself. "Erm—absofreakinlutely! Eh—no, that doesn't sound good, either." He added, pacing up and down thoughtfully, "Affirmative! No, now I sound like K-9."

"Who?" Amy asked, shaking her head, as she bent down and uplifted the now slightly dented coffee pot. Handing it to Rory, Amy said, "Once again Doctor, you're not making any sense. Why not just say, 'yes?' like everyone else?"

"Oh, there you go, expecting me to be dull like some ordinary person. Sorry, can't do it. It's against my personal ethics. Don't ever ask me to do that again, Amy Pond!" He admonished his friend, wagging a finger at her.

"Anyway," Amy said with a patient sigh, "getting back to the point, what exactly did you do to The Shadow Maker?"

"Did you know, that there's something like a thousand different chemical compounds in a single cup of coffee? At least ten percent of every cup of java contains known carcinogens? But, it's also an antioxidant, anti-depressant and, it's good for your short-term memory! So, good news, bad news, when it comes to coffee."

"Oh good, now I can impress all my mates next time we go into a coffee shop." Rory said. "But what's that got to do with poisoning The Shadow Maker?"

"It's a rare chemical known as glarganene. Harmless to humans. Earth scientists won't even discover it for at least another hundred years. It's even harmless to the Umbra, until it's combined with seven other chemicals."

"Such as?" Amy asked him, tilting her head skeptically. She'd seen a lot of weird stuff while traveling in the TARDIS, but killing someone with a cup of hot coffee?

"To be exact; glarganene combined with alkaloid caffeine, dextrine, sulphuric acid, chlorine, h20, nitrogen and calcium. That's why I asked for cream in my coffee, Rory."

"Right." Rory nodded. The Doctor was already busy making repairs to the console monitor. Rory held the damaged coffee pot aloft, waving it in the air. "Hoo-ray for coffee! Now, how about I go and brew us a fresh pot?"

"Are you trying to poison me, Rory?" The Doctor said, turning around with a horrified look upon his face.

"Erm—no!" a surprised Rory protested.

"Because Amy's told me about your coffee," the Doctor said, slipping her a mischievous wink, "and I personally wouldn't try it on a Dalek, if what she says is anything to go by."


End file.
